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Originally Posted by Doitsu
Thanks for your tests. So it seems that the Kindle 3 and the Kindle 4 have problems with this issue, but more recent models don't, which would suggest that there's something different about their firmwares that makes them behave exactly like KP.
The odd thing is that for once Calibre is more KF8 compliant than Kindlegen, because the guide items in the azw3 file that I generated with it, worked fine even on my K3. But as you know from your own professional experience, Amazon often rejects .mobi files generated by Calibre.
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Yes, it
is odd. And, yes, Amazon, I'm told by people who would know, has rejected Calibre files, but I don't know if they are rejecting the "new" AZW/AZW3 files that Kovid's (so to speak) putting out. The rejected files that have been sent to me by dejected DIY'ers all had K8 formatting attempts. I know that (damn, can't think of his name, the guy that created XYWRiter, oh, Simon, I think) makes his books with Calibre and seems pretty happy with it, according to a recent post of his. It
seems that the basic mobis have worked fine, to this point, via Calibre, only the K8-attempts were failing,
to my own knowledge. I've seen exceedingly few reliable coherent reports on failed Calibre files, so you mayn't be asking the right person, after all. ;-)
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Originally Posted by Doitsu
Since you're the one with first hand experience with KDP, here is a question that you're uniquely qualified to answer:
Will KDP a accept .mobi files that contain only KF8 or Mobi7 content without the source code that KindleGen embeds in the file?
I.e. is it possible to simply upload a KF8-only file with the azw or azw3 extension or does KDP always expect a .mobi file (unless users upload the actual .html or .epub source files)?
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Again, probably the wrong person to ask as I don't have enough experience with Calibre to even know what all the icons do/mean. Well, wait, I know that you can still upload a PRC file at the KDP, although I'm not 100% sure if you can upload it "raw" with the prc file extension, or if you can do so by the simple expedient of renaming the extension ".mobi," which I factually know will work. Thus, your basic zipped prc file works, that has
not been through Kindlegen, but in fact ran through the old MBPC. I would surmise that it might be possible to upload an azw or azw3 file and have it accepted, BUT, I think you'd have to change the extension. I have no idea what the hell that would do to the file, as I really don't play with Calibre. Heavens know, it's easy enough to find out; one could simply try it at your test Amazon account (if you don't have one, I can try a test or two for you, if you'd like), and only publish it to draft state. Not sure that that rambling helped, but, yes, you can publish a file that has already been zipped, and has an OPF, and has NOT been through Kindlegen. That much, we do know. ETA: And, of course, you can publish an ePUB, also a zipped file with an OPF that hasn't yet been through KG, right?
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Also would you agree that a non-functioning Go to Beginning guide item is a minor inconvenience that the OP shouldn't be worried about since it will only affect two older Kindle generations and most people probably won't even notice that it doesn't work.
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YES.
I know that the OP wants it to be perfect, but I genuinely think that 99% of the (K3/K4) population will never notice. The default for Kindle is simply the first page. Who would even give it a thought, if it went to the title page, or the half-title page, or the copyright page? I certainly wouldn't. As a pro, I might "tsk-tsk," if it didn't open on the Prologue or the epigraph or the first page of Chapter 1, but, hell, that's from a pro. Fully half of my clients want the "start" location at the first page after the cover (if not the cover), not at Chapter 1, anyway, in order to inflict all their frontmatter on the reader. (I usually talk them out of it, but...) I mean, if it were actually named "Start Reading," that would be a different thing, but "go to beginning?" Meh. Could mean almost anything, and people simply flip pages to get to Ch. 1.
I am not getting ulcers over it. It's a K3 glitch which I'll dutifully report to Amazon, along with my other reports about font weirdnesses and other fun factoids, and I won't give it another second's thought. It will be fixed when it's fixed, probably about the same time iBooks allows centering of elements without adding another layer of coding for no reason.
I don't think it's water off a duck's back, but I do think it's close to it.
Personally, I find the K3/Touch disappearing fonts a REAL issue that IS giving me ulcers
Compared to that, this eeensy little "start" location thing is just...well, eeensy. Font-testing is now my life.
My $.02, FWIW,
Hitch